


Eight Pairings For Problem Sleuth

by Path



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures, Problem Sleuth (Webcomic)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-23
Updated: 2011-05-23
Packaged: 2017-10-19 17:34:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/203384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Path/pseuds/Path
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are one of the top Problem Sleuths in the city. Solicitations for your person are numerous in quantity.</p><p>Sleuth/Everybody, practice in getting back to Midnight City Stories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eight Pairings For Problem Sleuth

**Author's Note:**

> ...while I'm writing number fics, I might as well get this one out there. It's important to know that I could easily have made this All The Pairings For Problem Sleuth or All The Pairings For Spades Slick, but I wanted to focus on the ones I, you know, cared about. Also important for those having Doc Scratch And His Giant Head problems: this is the design I'm going for for my canon. (http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y57/thephoenixweeps/longnight.png?t=1306155900)

_Curves_

Things with her are easy. Well, as easy as any relationship with a dame is. They're all crazy. Sleuth is convinced of this.

But when he comes over to her unfailingly neat apartment, he can trust there's nothing more at stake than having to go back home again. It's just them, and they've never struggled with real awkwardness or unhappiness because at heart, Sleuth knows what those are. And this relationship ain't gonna provide that. And that's the way he likes it. He gets enough awkwardness and unhappiness in the rest of his life.

But they don't talk about business. He comes over, they have a nice dinner together, and sometimes he stays. Sometimes she wears this corset, and Sleuth is forcibly reminded of how he deals with men all the time and how sometimes, he forgets what a woman's like.

By which he means, curvy. Damn. He puts his hands on her waist, smooth and straight in corset bones, and moves them down over her hips. Then he just does that a few more times. Yep. Something to be said for a woman's touch. And hips.

= = =

 _Naivete_

At first, Problem Sleuth feels sort of bad about it, like he's taking advantage of the poor guy. But it doesn't take that long for him to figure out that Pickle Inspector isn't as naive as he seems, or at least, his mild vagueness doesn't interfere in bed. It's actually kind of... cute, Sleuth thinks. Inspector's disconcerting focus isn't so weird when it's performed in close quarters, and one-on-one. Or maybe it's just nice having someone _else_ Sleuth can count on not to stab him during the act.

He asks questions, occasionally, polite ones like "Is this acceptable?" or "Would you prefer me on top?" and Sleuth tends to just grab him and make him do whatever the answer obviously was going to be ("Yes," and "Duh," respectively). Inspector gives an innocently excited smile when Sleuth pushes him around, like he's still completely delighted by the whole situation, and Sleuth just sits back and has a good time. It's nice. It's not... complicated.

= = =

 _Blank_

Problem Sleuth is face-down into a reflectionless black floor, and he can't quite get around the idea that all of this was a terrible, terrible plan. It really didn't seem so bad earlier. But his wrists are knotted in some extremely effective tie he'd love to learn in a less hands-on fashion, and there's a stiletto at his neck, so it would seem like he must have gone wrong somewhere.

"Do you want to know why you're here?" asks his captor. As he formulates a hardboiled reply, he gets a sharp kick in the ribs. He skids across the blank floor and doubles up, protecting his ribs with his knees. Not that those are considerably more durable. "Let me explain," comes the voice again. It is calm. It is cool. It is blank like the floor. His head is pulled back, Diamonds Droog's long fingers clenching a fistful of Sleuth's hair to expose his throat.

When Droog finally stops his creepy foreplay, Sleuth's actually almost relieved. Maybe if the guy finally gets off he'll lighten up.

= = =

 _Twisted_

He knew she was dangerous all along. She's the epitome of the dangerous dame. So really, he couldn't resist her. Not if he wanted to remain the most hardboiled guy in town.

And it's not like she didn't show him a good time. Snowman is the most wanted woman in town, and not just by the law. She's gone when he wakes up in their twisted sheets, of course (and Sleuth is confident that the police will be arriving any moment, and that everything will probably condemn him as the obvious killer), but he can't help a brief thought for the night before.

It's the image of her, silhouetted in his office door, and the drifting smoke from her cigarette filtering through his mind. He's never met anyone else with such a perfect understanding of the way the world ought to be. She knows exactly what she looks like, and she loves it.

It's such a perfect situation, laid out lovingly just for him, that he ends up staying and letting the police corral him, just for the experience of it. Maybe she didn't do it for him. But in a way, she did.

= = =

 _Infuriating_

The Doctor is infuriating to deal with. He makes Problem Sleuth want to throw his hat down and jump on it a few times every conversation they have. Getting information out of him is like treasure hunting; until you hit X, everything else is just distraction. He wants to throttle Scratch.

That's why he keeps coming back. The banter is fun. He just can't count on shaking Doc Scratch down for anything, because he'll get exactly as much information as Scratch wants him to have, and he'll always end up where the Doc wants, instead of the other way around.

Today, for example, he came in looking for proof of the Felt's involvement in the downtown bank heist, and in an amount of time Sleuth finds it hard to name (it's always tricky like that around Felt), he's got the Doctor pinned up against the wall. He definitely didn't intend to do it. It just turns out that way.

Doc Scratch smiles his blank and featureless smile, but Sleuth can tell he's genuinely amused. His blank and featureless eyes always glint a bit when he's laughing- at least, that's what Sleuth chooses to believe. He's just so charming and clever that Sleuth can't help getting pulled in as he does.

He leans into him and decides to have a good time. He might as well; his little sessions with the Doc are by far the easiest and most enjoyable of his interactions with the Felt. And once in awhile, Sleuth believes he deserves an easy, good time.

= = =

 _Unfair_

They team up on him. It is ridiculously unfair, a bad show all around, and, Sleuth is forced to admit later, kind of hot actually. Trace behind, holding him back, and then Fin in front, accounting for and foiling all his attempts to escape. After awhile, Sleuth just doesn't bother. It's easier to let them get what they came for and deal with it later, than to deal with the two of them together now.

One of them's always holding him down. Once he feels needle-sharp teeth in both shoulders, piercing muscle as two bodies, green-tinted and growling, writhe against him. It is agonizing and amazing and okay, maybe he's got a bit of a thing for biting now. His mind floating disjointedly away from his body, Problem Sleuth wonders whose fault _that_ is.

= = =

 _Understanding_

It's Spades Slick's fault. Problem Sleuth takes no responsibility whatsoever.

Wrecking a perfectly good stakeout, what an asshole. Sleuth comes up for air, and Slick grabs his lower lip between sharp teeth. Sleuth's already bleeding in a dozen places. Just business as usual, he figures. Nothing he can't do without.

Slick's scrabbling at Sleuth's shirt like he can afford to lose those buttons; Sleuth is forced to admit that he's completely and utterly fine with sewing all those back on as long as Slick is the one ripping them off. He's all bite and unveiled frustration and need, and if Sleuth can't make him happy he can at least calm him down. He got jumped as soon as he entered the alleyway where Slick was waiting for him, and then it was a dash back to Sleuth's office, just a minute away but a dozen stops beneath burnt-out streetlights, in the cracks between buildings, under the awnings of blacked-out for sale stores in the rain, hot gasps of breath the only warmth in the world.

They sweep everything off Sleuth's desk and Slick shoves him down on it, and Sleuth doesn't fight him (much), just lets him get it out. Later Slick'll grudgingly apologize and Sleuth'll hold it over him for months, and everything'll work out about even all told. After all, Slick's his escape too, even if he's not as aggressive about it. They've got an understanding- he's probably one of the only people in the world who understands Spades Slick.

Which means, in its way, that Spades Slick understands him, too.


End file.
